SEAL Wolf In Too Deep(4)
“Your daughter’s breathing and her heartbeat’s steady,” Allan reassured Franny, though he couldn’t know for sure about the baby’s overall condition until the EMTs took her to the clinic and had her checked out.
Debbie frowned a little at him, and he realized he’d made another mistake. The problem was that his wolf senses were enhanced enough that he could hear, smell, and see things that humans couldn’t. Debbie probably figured he was just soothing the mother with a story. The truth was that he could hear the baby’s heartbeat. It was steady, which gave him a modicum of relief.
The ambulance pulled up and the medics took over from there. Allan should have asked Franny more particulars about the accident, but he wasn’t thinking as clearly as he normally did in an emergency. Not that Franny could have responded with any real mental clarity, but it was something he should have done in a case like this.
He and Debbie were shaking as hard as Franny from the cold, but the EMTs had already given them blankets too.
“My…purse,” Franny said, her teeth chattering.
“Anything else you need from the car?” Allan wished he could put on his wolf coat or his wet suit. He was afraid she had something damning in her purse with regard to being lupus garou, though he couldn’t imagine what. He didn’t want to jeopardize their situation if anyone else went to get the bag for her later. So he made the decision to go after it, despite how chilled he was.
“Just…purse,” she managed to get out. “Front…seat.”
Then again, the hypothermia might be the reason she felt she had to have her purse. It might have nothing to do with keeping their secret safe. Just more of a concern about her money, credit cards, driver’s license, and whatever else she might have in it. Hell, he knew of a case where a woman told her adult son to return to her burning house to retrieve her laptop. And then she was kicking herself for it afterward, wondering why she even had him do it. Irrational, sure, but people could do or say crazy things in a crisis.
Still, Allan felt it was safer if he went back for it—just in case. “I’ll get it for you,” he reassured Franny.
Debbie took hold of his arm. “You’re already suffering from hypothermia. Let someone else do it.”
“I’ll be fine. I’m already wet. We’ll get warm and dry real soon.” Their wolf pack didn’t have wolves working for the sheriff’s department, except for Paul and Allan as contracted divers. So they had to take care of their own. Not that he could let on to Debbie why that was so.
At the edge of the culvert, he dropped the blanket on top of the snow.
Despite already being soaking wet and chilled to the marrow of his bones, he felt even colder when he entered the water. But his faster wolf healing abilities would help him overcome this more quickly than any human responder could.
He waded out, then dove into the submerged SUV, glad Debbie had returned to the hatchback to protect herself from the chilling wind. He pulled his flashlight out in case he needed it and to make sure no one would question how he found the purse in the dark. He was certain Debbie would be watching to ensure he would return safely.
He located the black leather bag resting on the roof of the upside-down SUV and pulled it out. Fearful he wouldn’t be able to hold on to the purse in the fast-moving water, he clutched it to his chest and waded to the shore. Once there, he grabbed the blanket and wrapped it around himself, then trudged slowly up the slope to the waiting ambulance. He felt as if he were wearing wet cement shoes.
“Thank you,” Franny said, taking her sopping-wet bag and holding it tightly to her body, as if it were her baby too.
The EMTs shut the ambulance doors, but before the ambulance took off, a bark came from inside. Then with its lights flashing and siren blaring, the ambulance headed for the clinic as some of the sheriff’s men arrived at the scene.
Debbie was staring at the ambulance as it drove away. “Did you hear a dog bark inside the ambulance?”
“No.” A wolf, yes. Dog? No.
“You should have let someone else get her bag, Allan. You’re not invincible,” she said, shaking hard as they sat inside the vehicle with the heat blasting them, a cold north wind sweeping across the area as they waited to speak to the police officers who had just arrived.
“Well,” said Rowdy Sanderson, a homicide detective, his blue eyes considering the two of them, “why don’t you get into something warm and dry before both of you need hospitalization too. I’ll handle this until you can file a report.”
“What the hell are you doing here? No dead bodies,” Allan said. He knew Rowdy was here because Debbie was.
“Could have been,” Rowdy said, glancing at Debbie.
“Thanks. We’re out of here,” Allan replied. They had to get into dry clothes pronto.
Allan and Debbie were always on call if something came up. They had been finishing up some paperwork on the Van Lake murder case. A car had been found in one of the area lakes, and the driver had contusions that were probably not due to the car accident. More likely, the victim had been beaten and the accident had been staged. Allan and Debbie had been on their way to get lunch at the pizzeria when they saw Franny’s SUV upside down in the culvert.
He still couldn’t believe it had been one of his wolf pack members. He would have contacted Paul and Lori with the news right away, but he knew the EMTs would let them know what had happened. He figured it was safer that way, rather than calling them in front of Debbie.